Piano.



W. M. BAUER.

PIANO.

APPLICATION FILED JUNE 24, 15.311. 5 2 SHEETS-ISHEET 1. 5: /w 0\, /6 /0 1 Z5 /6 D a 2g nu :.I.

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fnx/emZr-x W. M. BAUER.

PIANO.

APPLICATION FILED 'JUNE 24, 1911.

Patented Sept. 5, 1911.

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COLUMBIA PLANOGRAPH C0.. WASHINGTON. D. c.

WILLIAM M. BAUER, OF CHICAGO, ILLINOIS.

PIANO.

Specification of Letters Patent.

Patented Sept. 5, 1911.

Application sied rune 24, 1911. serial no. 635,211.

To all whom it may concern.'

Be it known that I, VrLLrAr/r M. BAUER, a citizen of the United States, residing at Chicago, in the county of Cook and State of Illinois, have invented a new and useful Improvement in Pianos, of which the following is a specification.

The metal plate used in piano-construction to extend over the sounding-board is objectionable for various reasons, including t-hose of enhancing the metallic quality of the tone of the instrument and greatly adding to its weight because of the ribbed reinforcement required in its structure to compensate for the weakening thereof due to the openings it necessarily contains.

The primary object of my invention is to enable this metal plate to be dispensed with and all of the objections attendant upon its use to be avoided, and the substitution for i't of a wooden plate, with the advantage of greatly improving the tone-quality of the instrument and that of materially reducing its weight but without impairment of the structure in the matter of strength to resist the great strains to which the taut strings and hammer-action against them subject it. The construction employed for the embodiment of my invention affords advantages, however, whether the plate used be of metal or of wood; so that while the provision of the wooden plate accomplishes a great desideratuin, it is not indispensable for the attainment of some of the advantages of that construction.

I have embodied my invention in, and in fact have more immediately devised it for, the upright form of piano, and therefore confine the description thereof hereinafter contained to that type of instrument and illustrate it in that connection in the accompanying drawings, in which- Figure 1 is a broken view in elevation of an upright piano embodying my invention, the view showing only a portion of the strings of the upper register fastened to the pin-block and my wooden plate extending therefrom; Fig. 2 is a section on line 2, Fig. 3; Fig. 3 is a section on line 3, Fig. 1; Fig. et

is a section on the irregular line 4 4, Fig.

1; Fig. 5 is a broken sectional view like a portion of the showing in Fig. 4, but illustrating a modification, and Fig. 6 is a face view of the same.

Only so much of the instrument is shown in the drawings as is required for understanding my invention from the following description, namely a portion of the open back with the corresponding portions, spaced therefrom, of the pin-block and my wooden plate extending from it as a continuation thereof, and portions of the sounding board between the back and plate having the bearings or agraifes for the strings connected through openings in the plate with the usual bridge on the soundingboard.

The back of the piano, as shown, is of a usual construction comprising a series of vertical and massive wooden posts 7 spaced apart and suitably joined at their upper and lower ends by transversely-extending rear boards 8, 9, an upper front board 10 and a pair of lower front boards 11 and 12. The sounding-board 13, reinforced, as usual, by rear wooden bars 14 at intervals between its ends, is fastened at its upper end to the under side of the board 10 and at its lower end between the two boards 11, 12, and all this may be in the ordinary manner shown, the sounding-board carrying on its face the usual bridge 15.

The wooden pin-block 16 and plate 17 (which lat-ter is commonly metal, as aforesaid, but which I make of wood,) are formed, preferably as shown, as a continuous wooden plate of several layers of veneer cemented flat-wise together with the grains of successive layers crossing each other. To thus build up the plate to the proper thickness I prefer to use veneer of the thickness of about one-fourth of an inch; and five such layers are shown in the drawing. This combined pin-block and plate is securely and rigidly fastened to the backstructure by bolts 18 at intervals near the upper and lower ends and similar intermediate bolts passing through relatively-large holes 19 in the sounding-board provided to admit them therethrough; some of these bolts also serving to fasten in place flatwise against the plate 17 a curved reinforcingstrip 2() for the screws 21, about the projecting head-ends of which the lower ends of the strings 22 are passed, this strip being also formed, by preference, of layers of veneer, of which two are shown in Fig. 3. rThe tuning-pins 23 are provided on the block 16, as usual, and the strings 22 which eX- tend from them about the screws 21 pass in the ordinary manner between the spaced longitudinally-ribbed metal bearing-bars M 25 fastened to the pin-block just below the pins 23. Numerous large-sized holes 26 are formed at intervals through the plate 17 for the free circulation of air at the tace of the sounding-board. The metal agrati'e-bar 27 for the strings, with the agraii'e-heads 28 projecting at proper intervals from its front face, has a metal stem 29 extending backwardly from each head through a relativelylarge hole 30 provided in the plate 17 and fastened to the sounding-board bridge l5 preterably by screwing them therein as represented in Fig. l. Thus the bar 27 is supported on the bridge l5 in spaced relation to, or out of contact with, the face of the plate 17. Any suitable form ot agratl'e-device may be used for this purpose, that shown in Figs. 5 and 6, by way of one modification, having the bar 271 formed of wood with sets of pins 281 projecting inclinedly from its face for holding the strings, and wooden stems 291 extending at intervals from its bach to pass through the plate-holes 30 and enter holes in the bridge l5 in which they are fastened, as by cementing them. By thus connecting the strings with the sounding-board at its bridge through the medium of stems, whether of metal or wood, the vibrations of each set of strings at the same pitch by thus transmitting them to the sounding-board are, in a sense, individualized and the resultant tone is thereby rendered of much better quality than where, as heretofore, the strings are stretched across the sounding-board bridge in direct contact therewith. Moreover, the interposition between the strings and the sounding-board of a wooden plate, instead ot' one of metal, further materially enhances the improvement referred to in the tone-quality of the instrument.

That I claim as new and desire to secure by Letters Patent is l. In a piano, the combination with -a sounding-board provided with a bridge, of a plate covering the sounding-board, and an agral'e-device having stems extending rearwardly from it through said plate and secured to said bridge to support thereon said device in spaced relation to the face of the plate.

2. In av piano, the combination with the sounding-board provided with a bridge, of

a plate covering the sounding-board, and an agrafe-device comprising a bar having string-engaging means projecting from its front face and stems extending at intervals from its opposite face through said plate into said bridge and secured therein to support said bar in spaced relation to the tace of the plate.

3. In a piano, the combination with the sounding-board provided with a bridge, of a non-metallic plate covering the soundingboard, and an agraie-device having stems extending at intervals rearwardly from it through said plate and secured to said bridge to support thereon said device in spaced relation to the tace oi the plate.

4L. In a piano, the combination with the sounding-board provided with a bridge, ot a wooden plate covering the sounding-board, and means for connecting the strings of the instrument through the plate with said board at its bridge.

5. In a piano, the combination with the sounding-board provided with a bridge, and the pin-block, of a wooden plate extendingr from said block and covering said board, and means for connecting the strings of the instrument through the plate with said board at its bridge.

(3. In a piano, the combination with the sounding-board provided with a bridge, and the pin-block, of a wooden plate, formed of a plurality of layers of veneer secured tlatwise together, and extending from said block to cover said board, and an agrait'edevice comprising a bar having string-e11- gaging means on its front face and stems extending at intervals from its opposite face through said plate and secured to said bridge to support thereon said bar in spaced relation to the face of said plate.

7. In a piano, the combination with the sounding-board provided with a bridge, of a combined wooden pin-block and soundingboard-covering plate formed of a plurality of layers of veneer secured tiatwise together, and an agratl'e-device having rearwardlyextending stems passing through said plate and secured to said bridge.

IVILLIAIWI M. BAUER.

In the presence of- J. Gr. ANDERSON, It. A. Soi-ranma.

Copies of this patent may be obtained for five cents each, by addressing the Commissioner of latents, Washington, D. C. 

